


come on, say it right

by girljustdied



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-12
Updated: 2012-02-12
Packaged: 2019-10-08 03:20:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17378612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girljustdied/pseuds/girljustdied
Summary: karen and kip and a last dance.





	come on, say it right

**Author's Note:**

> prompts were "angry," "dance," "misery," "sappy."

He goes to what is basically Karen’s de facto wedding reception because Shelia hadn’t realized that Karen might not want him there when she invited him. He goes because he’s never been to the fucking circus before, might as well give it a shot. He goes because Karen is his best friend.

She’s not surprised to see him, which makes sense, because he’s been acting like a stalker for weeks and hadn’t even realized it—not even when Ian told him so and beat the shit out of him. Two unrelated actions, but really it all sort of blurs together.

Honestly, he hadn’t even realized it until just then. That flash of wariness that flitted across her face when she opened the door all dressed in white.

“Hi,” she says, not holding his gaze, voice almost but not quite genuinely bright. “I’m glad you came.”

He can’t fucking help himself: “Not afraid I’m gonna make a scene or something?”

That snaps her back, eyes locking with his. “Well, are you?”

Sometimes, much later, deep down, he imagines that was an invitation.

“Didn’t have it in mind,” he shoves his hands in his pockets, plays it cool.

“Good,” she chirps. Kisses him on the cheek and moves on to make small talk with Tina Kaminski.

He’s never fucked Tina. Maybe he should. But mostly he can’t stop looking at Karen and picking at the scabs on his knuckles.

After a few beers, he’s not really feeling better. Karen and Jody got hitched at the courthouse, and apparently they’d decided to save all the romantic ceremony shit for this party. It makes him sick, and not because he wants Karen, but because they used to make fun of this sort of stuff all the time. Karen used to go on and on about how marriage was antiquated, sexist, that she’d never—

Well, he guesses that he’s said a lot of things he didn’t really mean either.

They wrote each other vows and read them aloud before the giant, white cake Shelia made is open for business. Karen’s are dry and self-deprecating and make his chest feel tight. Jody uses the word “like” twenty-seven times and quotes Guns and Roses.

His first thought is that he has no clue how he lost to the missing link between monkey and man. The second is that he hasn’t lost, it’s not over yet, no fucking way. Not with the baby in her belly.

He finally gets her to dance with him around the time “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” starts playing on Shelia’s small sound system.

“Nice playlist,” he grins.

“Right?” she’s only half joking, arms slung casually around his neck.

“You’re showing a little,” one of his hands moving from the small of her back to poke her belly with his thumb.

“Thanks,” she replies shortly.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure they can Photoshop it out of the pictures.”

She laughs, and holds onto him a little tighter. This is when he should stop talking and enjoy the moment—let her enjoy the moment and the night and the rest of her life if she can manage it with that caveman at her side.

Instead:

“Even if it turned out that it wasn’t mine, I still think I’d wanna take care of it, you know.”

He wants to be there for her. With her. Whatever.

“You think so, huh?”

She’s testing him, he thinks. He’s just not sure what for. “Yeah, I think so. Hell, if it was Frank’s, it’d still technically be family.”

She recoils slightly as if he’d hit her, but recovers quickly.

“Well, Jody knows for a fact that he isn’t the father, and he married me. And did you hear all that stuff he said before? About loving me no matter what?” she shakes her head and loosens her grip on him slightly like she’s planning on pulling away, but doesn’t. “So thanks anyway.”

“Was that really all you were waiting for? Some sappy declaration that’d make you feel safe?”

“Fuck you, Lip.”

This whole situation isn’t happening like it should.

“Because there’s no such thing, Karen. Nothing’s sacred, anything can get fucked up, no one’s gonna be together forever—not really. Not like on TV.”

“Oh, you mean like on _Teen Mom 2_?” she pokes holes in his logic immediately, makes him feel that spark like always. “Has it ever occurred to you that, maybe, just maybe, I don’t want to be with you, and that’s it? That you could say anything, tell me you love me, whatever, and it just wouldn’t matter?”

It’s a good question.

He bites his tongue for a long, heavy moment. “I do love you.” Says it because maybe it’s true. Says it because maybe it’ll make her change her mind.

But all she does is sigh, and put her head on his shoulder like she doesn’t even want to look at him.

“Great,” her voice bitter and quiet and muffled. “Good for you.”

“Karen—”

“You know, Lip,” her head popping back up, eyes searching. “I really thought you were better than that.”

“Than what?”

“Just please stop. Stop talking for once and just dance with me.”

Her head fits back down into his shoulder, and she clutches at him tightly until the song ends, and that’s it.

That’s not it. That night she throws rocks at his window, and when he finds her in the van in the yard she’s on him immediately, lips crushing against his and arms tight around his neck, tugging him down on top of her.

“Karen,” he breathes. Not because he wants to put a pause on this or anything, but more because he can’t help it.

“Don’t say anything,” she half growls, half begs, nails digging into his back underneath his t-shirt. “Don’t say anything.”

They strip each other naked easily, it’s only natural with them, habit. But the silence, the strained breaths, the tenseness in her muscles and the way she cries out—the way he cries out—that’s different.

She rolls her hips as he thrusts down into her and tells him to come, that she wants him to come. But he can’t let it be over that quickly, reaches between their bodies to touch her clit.

“Lip, don’t—” she moans and twitches against him, slightly off their rhythm.

“I want you—I want you to—”

She comes with a shout of his name, and he spills into her seconds after, his head buried in the crook of her neck.

He’d meant what he said to Debs. Couldn’t manufacture it. It was there or it wasn’t. And it mostly wasn’t. But Karen was different. Karen had fucked his fucking father, and she was still—Lip still—

“What now?” He watches her tug her clothes back on, something like fear sparking in his chest.

Her words sound like a mantra: “I’m gonna go home, and I’m gonna tell Jody what happened, and he’s gonna forgive me, and this is never gonna happen again.”

“Just like that.”

“Exactly like that. I know it’s a foreign concept to you, but—”

“What the fuck are you even—” he takes in a deep breath, starts over, “Karen, I love you. I love you, okay? Can we just stop all this bullshit?”

“No, you don’t,” she shoots back as she ties her sneakers with added aggressiveness. “You promised, remember?”

“Are you really gonna hold that against me?” he begins to follow suit, yanking his jeans back on instead of moving to clutch at her like before.

“Well, you seem primed to hold what happened with Frank over my head for the rest of my life, so—”

And it still burns fresh, just like the first time—

“You know, I’m not the only one who keeps bringing that up, so maybe you should direct some observation inward before you start on my issues—”

“I fucked things up, Lip!” she bursts out abruptly, her tone shifting. She reaches forward and holds his face between her hands pleadingly. “Okay? Everything’s fucked, I’m fucked. I’m sorry. Let it go.”

The fight deflates immediately at the slump of her shoulders, at her self-loathing. At his.

“I’ve tried,” he mutters.

“Try harder.”

Can’t fake it anymore.

 


End file.
